1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to the field of communications. More particularly, this invention relates to systems and methods for timed ring suppression of communications devices.
2. Description of the Related Art
Telecommunications has experienced explosive growth, and more growth is planned as telecommunication access and numerous communications devices improve. This explosive growth is revolutionizing special services offered to subscribing customers. Of the special service offerings, the most relevant to this invention is the caller identification or Caller ID services. A customer or a user of a telephone that is served by the Caller ID service is provided with a calling party's directory information. Presently available Caller ID systems provide the calling party's telephone number and a billing name associated with the calling party's telephone number (if available) when an incoming caller line identification (ICLID) signal can be detected, decoded, and transmitted to the called telephone or other display device associated with the called telephone (e.g., a Caller ID device). The Caller ID services also allow the customer to receive directory information for other incoming calls while the customer's phone is used (e.g., during a conversation with another party); this service is sometimes referred to as Caller ID Call Waiting service.
A customer may use the displayed Caller ID information to make a decision to answer and/or to prepare for the call. In addition, the customer may use Caller ID information to block incoming calls associated with one or more ICLID signals including specific telephone numbers selected by the customer and/or privacy screening services for unidentifiable telephone numbers of incoming calls (e.g., telemarketers). If the customer wants to selectively answer incoming calls using Caller ID information, the customer has several choices—block the call or ignore the ringing (or other audible alerts) until the call is processed by a voice messaging system (or other call handling system) or until the caller hangs up. If the call is blocked, then the customer may not have immediate notification of the incoming blocked call to re-evaluate whether to accept the call since circumstances for accepting the call may change. If the customer ignores the call and listens to unwanted ringing, then the customer may be annoyed with the repetitive noise alerting the customer of the call. In recent years, telephony providers and manufacturers have tried to provide alternate systems and methods to alert the customer of selective incoming calls that minimizes interruptions for unwanted calls.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,351,289 to Logsdon et al., entitled “Caller ID Telephone Security Device,” discloses a caller ID telephone security system. This caller ID telephone security system mutes the ringer of a telephone until the ICLID signal of the incoming call is compared with a list of telephone numbers (or other reference data) to determine whether to activate the ringer and pass the call to the communications device. If the call does not pass through to the communications device, then the call is blocked, the ringer is never activated, and, thus, the customer is not alerted of the incoming call. Further, because this invention requires that the customer to predetermine which calls to pass through and which calls to block, if the customer has not identified a particular telephone number (or other reference data) to pass through or block, then a desired call may be blocked or an unwanted call may ring and pass through.
Another example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,400,814 to Adams, entitled “Telephone with Ringer Silencer Screening Feature,” discloses a telephone with a ringer silencer that allows the customer to depress a keypad to deactivate the ringer on a call-by-call basis after activation of the ringer by receipt of the incoming call. That is, the ringer produces an audible alert until the customer is able to depress the keypad. Once the keypad is depressed, the ringer does not produce another audible alert until the next incoming call. Another embodiment discloses a system that either deactivates the ringer or that allows the customer to depress a keypad to transfer the call to a voice messaging system thus terminating the signal to the ringer. Again, the customer may be annoyed with the ringing until the keypad is depressed, and if the customer accidentally depresses the transfer keypad, then the call is routed to voicemail and the customer can not answer the call.